The 2012 Summer Olympic Games, officially known as the Games of the XXX Olympiad and informally as London 2012, is occurring in London from July 27 through August 12.[1] During the Modern Olympic Games, the pagan origins of the Olympics have been replaced by faith-based achievement by the participating athletes.

Athletes from 204 National Olympic Committees are participating.[2] Sports contests having the greatest political interest are (note especially the growing list of lack of public schools for the gold medalists below):

Sport

Political issue

Answer

Multiple

How many athletes will do the equivalent of Tebowing after a victory? American Meb Keflezighi, who won the silver medal in the marathon in 2004, typically gives glory to God with the sign of the Cross after finishing a race.[3]

Missy Franklin, who has won the most gold medals of anyone in 2012 (tied with Michael Phelps), thanked God as one of her first comments after winning.

Gabby Douglas gave glory to God when she qualified to represent Team USA, and subsequently won two gold medals.

Soccer players in the United Arab Emirates team bowed toward Mecca when they scored a goal. They did not advance to the quarterfinals.

Multiple

Will almost no athletes from public school sports programs win any gold medals, despite how public schools spend more than $500 billion annually to teach and train Americans?

One athlete -- Greek triple-jumper Voula Papachristou -- was expelled from the Greek National team by her own country's Olympic committee before it officially opened based on a one-sentence joke about immigration, even though she apologized. The joke in question was this from her Twitter: "With so many Africans in Greece, the West Nile mosquitoes will be getting home food!!!" It should be noted that Papachristou apologized for the tweet.

In addition to the Greek Olympic Committee's decision on Papachristou, the IOC's own twitter-use policy has been criticized for hindering free speech. The policy, which is claimed to protect the IOC's commercial rights, goes as far as to prevent athletes from "reporting on events". According to The Globe and Mail, even a tweet such as "Won our games against China, USA. Next up, the Brazilians," could get an athlete expelled from the Games without notice. As of yet, no athletes have been expelled by the IOC for this social mediacensorship policy.

Beckham was not selected as the final torchbearer. He was, however, a passenger on the speedboat that carried the torch up the River Thames. He assisted in the hand-off of the torch to Sir Steve Redgrave, one of Britain's greatest Olympians. Sebastian Coe, chairman of London 2012, stated, "He [Beckham] will be more than an ambassador given what he has done, the commitment he has given and the amount of time he has spent with us in London on this project. He was not only alongside us when we won [the right to host the Olympics], he was alongside us when we threw our hats in the ring."[6]

In women's soccer, France finished with two wins and a loss and came in second in their group, which also included the United States (see below). They will face Sweden in the quarterfinals. Great Britain finished with a perfect 3-0-0 record and will face Canada in the quarterfinals.

On the men's side, Great Britain won their group with 2 wins and a draw. They will face South Korea in the quarterfinals.

Australia failed to qualify for either soccer event. This was their first time attempting to qualify out of the Asian Zone instead of the significantly weaker Oceanic Zone, so this may have been a factor. They will, however, send teams in most other team sports, since they qualify from the Oceanic Zone in those.

In women's basketball, France is 3-0, Australia is 2-1, and Great Britain is 0-3. All three are in the same six-team group, from which the top 4 advance to the quarterfinals. The French are guaranteed to advance, and the Australians almost certainly will as well.

In women's handball, Great Britain is 0-2 and France is 1-1. The top four in each of the two groups advance to the quarterfinals.

In men's basketball, Great Britain and Australia, both in Group B, are 0-2. France, in Group A, is 1-1. The top four in each group advance to the quarterfinals.

In men's volleyball, Australia split its first two games, while Great Britain is 0-2. The top 4 in each group advance to the quarterfinals. In women's volleyball, Great Britain is 1-1. Again, the top 4 teams out of 6 advance to the quarterfinals.

Multiple

Similarly, will atheist nations underachieve in general?

Increasingly atheistic Great Britain did not win its first gold medal until Day 5 (August 1), because few of the medal competitions in which GB is strong (rowing, cycling, canoeing especially) were competed for until Day 5. China, an officially atheist and communist country, leads the standings with 13 gold medals. Despite having more than three times the population of the United States and despite having a national program designed to produce champion athletes, China is trailing the USA in total medals (24-23) part of the way into Day 5, and has 13 gold medals to the United States's 9. Somewhat atheistic France is a distant third in total golds with 4. Australia has 1 gold and 6 total medals.

After a slow start, the United States beat France 98-71 in their first game. LeBron James had 9 points in 25 minutes, while Kobe Bryant was limited to 12 minutes but scored 10 points. Kevin Durant led all players from both teams with 22 points. In their third game, the United States blew out Nigeria, 156-83, setting records for points scored and margin of victory. Durant, Bryant, and LeBron all received limited minutes due to the blowout. Durant scored 14 points in 17 minutes, James scored 6 points in 11 minutes, and Bryant scored 16 points in 11 minutes.

Both players advanced to the semifinals, where Murray defeated Djokovic in straight sets. Murray will face Roger Federer of Switzerland for the gold, while Djokovic will face Juan Martin del Potro of Argentina for the bronze.

8-month pregnant athlete

Will the lamestream media report on Nur Suryani Mohamed Taibi of Malaysia, who is competing while being 8 months pregnant, or does that send too pro-life of a message?

Taibi was eliminated from the Olympics on the first day of official competition after finishing in 34th place. Few articles mentioned her prior to her elimination; there was more publicity about her after her defeat.[7][8][9][10] The New York Times ran an article on the athlete on 16 July 2012,[11] The Guardian [12] and ESPN [13] both reported on her results in the competition.

women's soccer

ranked #1 and won the gold in the last two Olympics, most recently with a foreign coach. Now that this U.S. team is politically correct, will it underachieve?[14] Major rivals will be Japan, Brazil and France.

Went 3-0 in their group to advance to the quarterfinals, where they beat New Zealand 2-0. They will face Canada in the semifinals.

They have been largely ignored. However, other minor sports with little national following have been equally ignored. See the entry above on the Malaysian shooter for an exception to this lack of coverage.

Several months before the games, Sports Illustrated ran a feature article entitled "The Transgender Athlete", which included significant overage of a transgender female-to-male shotputter attempting to qualify for the United States women's Olympic team. However, she failed to qualify at the US Olympic Trials, and as such has not received coverage during the actual Olympics.

Multiple

Will countries that have implemented same-sex marriage underperform? (See below for a more lengthy explanation)

Too early to tell. All countries are below their expected total (see chart below) so far, but this would be expected since so few events have been completed. Here is how much each nation should be expected to win, based on the chart below, and their actual totals so far. All expected totals are rounded to the nearest whole number. The overall total may not be equal to the sum of the individual expected totals due to this rounding. Also, the actual totals will not be meaningful one way or the other until more events have been completed.

Argentina - 5 expected, 0 actual

Belgium - 7 expected, 2 actual

Canada - 23 expected, 7 actual

Denmark - 4 expected, 3 actual

Iceland - 0 expected, 0 actual

Netherlands - 11 expected, 6 actual

Norway - 6 expected, 2 actual

Portugal - 3 expected, 0 actual

South Africa - 5 expected, 4 actual

Spain - 20 expected, 3 actual

Sweden - 7 expected, 2 actual

Total - 92 expected, 27 actual

Men's Handball

Will heavy underdogs Tunisia overperform in Group A? Group A should perhaps be dubbed the "Group of Left", since the other five teams are Sweden, Iceland, and Argentina, where same-sex marriage is legal, and increasingly atheistic Great Britain and France.

They lost to Sweden in their first game, 28-21. This was followed by a 32-22 loss to Iceland. Next up is France on August 2 at 11:15 AM local, 5:15 AM on the East coast of the United States. The top four in each six team group advance to the quarterfinals, which are single elimination. They are a long shot, but other than last place would be unexpectedly good.

Underachievement by atheistic nations will be particularly evident in the team sports, where spiritual motivation is usually non-existent. Expect the atheistic nations to underachieve most notably in soccer, where teamwork is paramount.

Also, since Great Britain is the host nation, it may receive a boost in performance in spite of its increasingly atheistic nature. One should be careful to account for this when comparing Britain's performance this year to that in previous Olympic Games.

Winners

Individual Events

Athlete

Achievement

Religion, or Atheist?

Team Events

Event

Country

Religious Category

Women's 4x100m Freestyle (Swimming)

Australia

Increasingly Atheistic

Men's Team Archery

Italy

Christian

Women's Team Archery

South Korea

Atheistic

Men's 4x100m Freestyle (Swimming)

France

Increasingly Atheistic

Women's Synchronized 3m Springboard (Diving)

China

Buddhist

Men's Synchronized 10m Platform (Diving)

China

Buddhist

Men's Artistic Team All-round (Gymnastics)

China

Buddhist

Expected Medals

There are many factors that contribute to a countries success in the Olympics (population, proximity host country, culture) and Gross Domestic Product cannot be used as a fair proxy, due to low-GDP China comfortably coming first in the 2008 Olympics and Russia ranking third. Below is how the Olympic medals would be awarded if each country earned medals in proportion to their GDP, which vastly overestimates the United States' performance.

Country

Expected Medals

Afghanistan

0.2

Albania

0.2

Andorra

0.1

Antigua and Barbuda

0

Angola

1.2

Algeria

2.3

Argentina

5.3

Armenia

0.1

Aruba

0

Australia

16.2

Austria

5.4

Azerbaijan

0.7

Bahamas

0.1

Bangladesh

1.4

Barbados

0

Burundi

0

Belgium

6.7

Belize

0

Benin

0.1

Bermuda

0.1

Bhutan

0

Bolivia

0.3

Bosnia-Herzegovina

0.2

Bahrain

0.3

Botswana

0.2

Belarus

0.8

Brazil

29.9

Virgin Islands

0

Bulgaria

0.7

Burkina Faso

0.1

Cameroon

0.3

Cambodia

0.2

Canada

22.6

Cayman Islands

0

Central African Republic

0

Chad

0.1

Chile

3

China

98.8

Taiwan

7.2

Colombia

4.1

Comoros

0

Cape Verde

0

Congo

0.2

Cook Islands

0

Costa Rica

0.5

Cote-d´lvoire

0.3

Croatia

0.9

Cuba

0.9

Cyprus

0.4

Czech Republic

2.8

Denmark

4.4

Djibouti

0

Dominica

0

Dominican Republic

0.7

Ecuador

0.8

Egypt

3.1

El Salvador

0.3

Equatorial Guinea

0.2

Eritrea

0

Estonia

0.3

Ethiopia

0.4

Fiji

0

Finland

3.4

France

39.8

Gabon

0.2

Gambia

0

Germany

47

Ghana

0.4

United Kingdom

32.4

Guinea-Bissau

0

Georgia

0.2

Greece

4.3

Grenada

0

Guam

0

Guatemala

0.6

Guinea

0.1

Guyana

0

Haiti

0.1

Honduras

0.2

Hong Kong

3.2

Hungary

1.8

Iceland

0.2

India

24.7

Indonesia

10.1

Iran

4.7

Iraq

1.2

Ireland

3

Italy

29.5

Israel

3.1

Jamaica

0.2

Japan

78.2

Jordan

0.4

Kazakhstan

2.3

Kyrgyzstan

0.1

Kenya

0.4

South Korea

14.8

North Korea

0.4

Kuwait

2

Laos

0.1

Latvia

0.4

Saint Lucia

0

Lebanon

0.5

Lesotho

0

Libya

0.9

Lichtenstein

0.1

Luxembourg

0.8

Macedonia

0.1

Madagascar

0.1

Malawi

0.1

Malaysia

3.3

Moldova

0.1

Marshall Islands

0

Maldives

0

Malta

0.1

Mali

0.1

Mauritania

0.2

Mauritius

0.1

Mexico

16.2

Micronesia

0

Monaco

0.1

Montenegro

0.1

Mongolia

0.1

Morocco

1.3

Mozambique

0.1

Myanmar

0.7

Namibia

0.2

Nepal

0.2

Netherlands

11.2

New Zealand

1.8

Nicaragua

0.1

Niger

0.1

Niger

0.1

Norway

5.9

Oman

0.7

Pakistan

2.4

Palau

0

Panama

0.4

Papua New Guinea

0.1

Paraguay

0.3

Peru

2.3

Philippines

2.9

Poland

6.7

Portugal

3.3

Puerto Rico

1.4

Qatar

1.4

Romania

2.3

Rwanda

0.1

Saint Lucia

0

Saint Kitts and Nevis

0

Samoa

0

San Marino

0

Saudi Arabia

6.2

Seychelles

0

Sierra Leone

0

Senegal

0.2

Slovenia

0.7

Solomon Islands

0

South Africa

5.2

Sri Lanka

0.7

Slovakia

1.3

Swaziland

0.1

Serbia

0.6

Singapore

3

Spain

20.2

Sudan

0.9

Suriname

0

Syria

0.8

Sweden

6.6

Switzerland

7.6

Tanzania

0.3

Tonga

0

Thailand

4.6

Togo

0

Trinidad and Tobago

0.3

Tajikistan

0.1

Timor-Leste

0

Turkmenistan

0.3

Tunisia

0.6

Turkey

10.5

Tuvalu

0

Uganda

0.2

Ukraine

2

United Arab Emirates

4.3

United States

209

Uruguay

0.6

Uzbekistan

0.6

Vanuatu

0

Venezuela

5.6

Vietnam

1.5

Yemen

0.4

Zambia

0.2

Zimbabwe

0.1

Commemoration

The 2012 games mark the 40th anniversary of 11 Israeli Olympic team members taken hostage and killed by Palestinianterrorist group Black September. The Internal Olympic Committee has been urged to offer a commemorative moment of silence for the athletes at the opening ceremony. The IOC has rejected the moment of silence or any mention of the tragic event so as not to upset Muslim countries. [18] Sportscaster Bob Costas says NBC will honor the Munich 11 despite IOC’s refusal to allow it. [19]

NBC Coverage

Scorn for Comcast's NBC coverage of the Olympic games hit America coast to coast. Viewers have taken to the internet with the trend #NBCfail for days now. The groans began at the opening ceremony when American viewers were denied the tribute to British victims of Islamic terrorism. As the games moved forward, live events were interrupted or had already finished, replaced with commercials and NBC commentators talking about the athletes. It has been reported the Comcast spent $1 billion for the rights to televise the 2012 Olympics.

See also

References

↑This makes London the first city to host the Games three times - the previous occasions being in 1908 and 1948.

↑Independent Olympic Athletes from South Sudan, who does not yet have a National Olympic Committee, and the former Netherlands Antilles, who no longer has a National Olympic Committee due to their dissolution, will also compete under the Olympic Flag.

↑A foreigner, reportedly a lesbian, was selected as the head coach of the already champion American Olympic women's soccer team in 2007, and in the following year that team repeated its gold medal-winning performance of 2004. Aren't there American, although perhaps not politically correct, soccer coaches good enough to run the Olympic team?

↑Although part of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, Aruba competes separately at the Olympic Games. Same-sex marriage is not legal in Aruba, although marriages performed in the European mainland Netherlands are recognized per the Kingdom's requirements. Additionally, the territories of Curacao and Sint Maarten, who will compete as "Independent Olympic Athletes" under the Olympic Flag following the dissolution of the Netherlands Antilles and the loss of recognition of their Olympic Committee, have the same regulations as Aruba with regards to same-sex marriage. Since citizens of these territories are also Dutch citizens, they are also eligible to compete for Team Netherlands. Therefore, they may have won some of the Dutch medals. In all three territories, the population is heavily Catholic and there is large opposition to same-sex marriage in spite of the Kingdom's requirements. When Bonaire, Sint Eustatius, and Saba opted to integrate fully with the Netherlands as part of the dissolution, the Dutch House of Representatives passed a law that will make same sex-marriage legal in those territories effective in October 2012. However, this law was strongly opposed by locals. Athletes from those three territories were permitted to compete as Independent Olympic Athletes as well. However, of the four IOAs at the Olympics, three are from Curacao and one is a marathoner from South Sudan, which does not yet have a national Olympic Committee.

↑In the United States, 6 out of 50 states permit same-sex marriage (Washington, D.C. also permits same-sex marriage), and 8 additional states permit civil unions. Two states (including Washington, which had previously recognized civil unions) have declared same-sex marriage legal, but implementation is postponed until after voter referendums on the laws in November 2012. Additionally, in Mexico, same-sex marriage is legal in Mexico City, a federal district roughly equivalent to Washington, DC, as well as in the state of Quintana Roo.

↑ Since the 2001 Australians have increasingly answered "no religion" in the official census. The growing numbers of those answering "no religion" has coincided with fewer people self-identifying as Christian: Year Book Australia, 2008